Gas B2B Service Order Outage Plan Version: 3.4 (FINAL) Date: September 2017 Prepared in collaboration by: Gas Retail Consultative Forum (GRCF) Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 1 of 8
1. Background A single industry agreed process for managing service orders in times of short term (greater than two hours but less than one day) system outages has been agreed to by participants. This was originally brought about as a result of there being a number of ways in which participants in the Victorian Retail Gas Market advised affected parties of system outages that impact the normal automated B2B flow of service orders. There were also multiple manual methods of exchanging service order information between participants to ensure same day priority jobs were actioned in a timely manner. An industry group was formed to review the issue with the following process and associated manual Service Order Request Form the outcome of their deliberations. Further discussions at the Contingency Plan meetings identified the need to address processes for outages that extended beyond one day (refer to section 4). This plan is a uniform process that has been developed by industry participants and it will be used if and when a B2B outage occurs, in the jurisdictions below. If this document is not followed, the participant may not have their service orders actioned within the timeframes in this document. 2. Application This plan has been agreed to and is utilised in the following markets: South Australian Retail Market Queensland Retail Market Victorian Retail Market NSW/ACT Retail Market Note: Amendments to this document must be agreed to by consultative forums of all four jurisdictions. Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 2 of 8
3. Contingency Plan Short Term Outages The table below identifies the steps to be taken and the participant responsible where a system outage has been identified and the duration of the outage is expected to be greater than 2 hours, or for shorter outages where the outage may impact on the sending or receipt of same day service requests and hence delay service provisions to customers beyond industry obligations. E.G. for failure at midday implement the process at 1pm at the latest to allow two hours for service request delivery and receipt, for failure at 1pm or after, implement the process immediately. Refer to Attachment 4. This table relates to the Contingency Plan Process Flow in Attachment 3. Step# Action Responsible Party 1./1a. A problem has been identified with a participant s Retailer/Distributor internal system that prevents the automated service order transactions being sent to / received from the market. 2./2a. Determine the duration of the system outage. Retailer/Distributor 3./3a. If the outage is less than 2 hours continue business as Retailer/Distributor usual. No notification is required to other participants 4. Where the outage is two hours or greater contact the Retailer affected Distributors by telephone using the industry agreed Contacts List. Prepare for manual processing. 4a. Confirm that the business is in readiness for moving to manual processes for service order processing. Distributor 4b./4c. The Participant is to notify all affected Participants Retailer / Distributor operational areas as per the B2B Contact List via email in the agreed industry template format. 5. Identify the jobs that have not been issued to the market that are Priority C and same day appointments, with particular emphasis on remove meter lock (RML) Retailer and no gas. Complete the Industry Service Order Request Form and email to the appropriate Distributor. 5a. Upon receipt of the email from the Retailer issue the Distributor job to the field using Distributor internal processes. 6./6a. Follow up regularly to determine if the system outage Retailer/Distributor has been rectified. 7./7b. Follow up activity results in advice that the system Retailer/Distributor outage is now over. Advise impacted parties that the problem has been rectified and resume sending service orders and associated transactions, including the backlog held up due to the system outage. 7a. Resume normal process by which service orders are Distributor issued to the field. Ensure that jobs processed manually are not reissued. Undertake a reconciliation process of the manually received jobs to those that subsequently come through the B2B process. Where a manual job has been received and there is no matching B2B transaction, a Distribution initiated service order response will be sent. 8./8a. Where the issue is not resolved, continue manual processes and provide updates as to the expected resolution timeframe. Retailer/Distributor Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 3 of 8
It should be noted the current industry practice whereby participants notify impacted parties of system outages via the FRC Relay, will continue. Emails can be sent bundled, where each service order is a separate word document. Only where issues with participants servers prevent the sending of emails, the Service Order Request form will be faxed to the Distributors. For new Retailers entering the market, AEMO and Distributors will be responsible for ensuring they are aware of this Plan. The agreed email notification mentioned in step 4.c is defined in attachment 2. 4. Outages beyond one business day The contingency plan process above covers outages that are confined to one business day. This process allows market participants the ability to raise and track manual priority C jobs and to reconcile the jobs easily as the volume is relatively low. However in a situation where a major outage has occurred and the outage continues beyond one business day, market participants will find it difficult to continue to operate under the defined process (see Attachment 3). In this case a different approach will need to be agreed between the affected market participants. Potential approaches that participants may consider are: Limit the number of priority C jobs raised within a day. Customers and Contact Centre staff may need to be advised that due to the outage, jobs may need to be postponed or rescheduled to a later date. Implementation of a more automated contingency plan if the outage cannot be rectified in a reasonable amount of time. This may require interim systems to be developed and implemented until the main systems resume normal operations. Note: it is expected that where an outage is longer than one day, the approaches will be agreed bilaterally between participants. Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 4 of 8
Attachment 1 Manual Service Order Request Retailer Manual Service Request Form Email / Faxes will only be actioned upon the DB s authorisation Fax # XX-XXXX-XXX NRC Email: xx@retailer.com.au Fax # XX-XXXX-XXX DB Email: xx@distributor.com.au ** are Mandatory Fields that must be completed **Retailer HUB ID Retailer Name Date/Time SO Operator Name initiated in RB system **Scheduled Date Phone Number Enquiry Code Priority Email Address **Enquiry Code Ebxml Message ID Retailer SO identification # Manual Despatch Details: Authorised By (DB) Reason Manual Despatch Required Service Details **Customer Name and contact number **Site Address Street Directory Ref (if applic) Instructions **MIRN Meter Number Meter Location Inlet Pressure (if applic) Distribution Use Only SO in DB system on receipt of MSR Distribution Reference # Despatched to COC (if applic) Lic # (if applic) MJLS (if applic) Yes / No Despatched Time Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 5 of 8
Attachment 2 - Email template The email template provides market participants with the ability to auto forward the advice to all internal operational areas. This ensures that areas are aware of the Contingency being called and have the expectation to commence receiving manual Priority C jobs The industry agreed format for the email is: Subject field: G#Contingency#Notice to Market# Content of email: CompanyName: [Retailer X] EventStartTime: dd/mm/yyyy hh:mm EventDuration: hh:mm hours EventMessage: Retailer X is having system problems; gateway down EventAdditionaInformation: The duration of the outage at Retailer X is unknown. A further update will be sent in 2 hours ContactName: Joe Bloggs ContactPhone: 03 9555 5555 Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 6 of 8
Attachment 3 Outage Plan Process Flow (all jurisdictions) Distributor (DB) Retailer (RB) 1. Problem is found with an internal system that prevents transactions being sent to / received from the market. 1a. Problem is found with an internal system that prevents transactions being sent to / received from the market. 2. Is the system outage likely to exceed 2 hours? Yes 2a. Is the system outage likely to exceed 2 hours? No No 3. Continue business as usual 4. Contact the impacted DBs by phone, using the appropriate B2B contact. Send a follow up email using the industry agreed template. Prepare for manual processing. 4a. DB prepares to receive emails containing same day Priority C jobs. Yes 3a. Continue business as usual 4b. Notify all affected Participants operational areas as per the B2B Contact List, and via email in the agreed industry template format 4c. Notify all affected Participants operational areas as per the B2B Contact List, and via email in the agreed industry template format 5. Using the industry agreed template, email service orders to DBs 5a. DB upon receipt of the email arranges for the SO to be issued to the field 6. Has the system issue been resolved? Yes No 7. Contact DBs to advise systems back to normal processing resumed. Stop sending emails 7a. DB resumes normal SO processing and reconciles emails with jobs received through the automated process. Send DB job where B2B job not received. 6a. Has the system issue been resolved? Yes No 8. Continue manual process and update DBs as to expected resolution time 7b. Contact RBs to advise systems back to normal processing resumed. Stop sending emails 8a. Continue manual process and update RBs as to expected resolution time Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 7 of 8
Attachment 4 Timeline for Short Term Outages 7am 8am 9am 10am 11am 12 1pm 2pm 3pm Outage > 2 hours identified Outage Plan Invoked Outages after this time Plan Invoked Immediately Gas Contingency Plan V3.4 8 of 8